Wireless network question: How do I set a (Manual) network to (Automatic)

Factual Questions
1

Gak - I feel like I should be able to figure this out, but I can’t.

I disconnected from my wireless network today (on my Windows XP computer). No biggie. But now, my computer won’t re-connect.

Ok… so I go into wireless properties and look under wireless networks and my network displays as follows “abbeynormal (Manual)”. It should read “abbeynormal (Automatic)” and then everything would be hunky-dory.

If I click on “View Wireless Networks,” my network does not show up. If it did, I could just tell it to reconnect. I think it does not show up because I have disabled broadcasting the SSID. But it seems like, since I have all the information on the network already keyed in, I should be able to see it. When the network is working/connected properly, I can click “View Wireless Networks” and see my network.

What I need to do is to reset my network as “(Automatic)”.

The complication: I need to do this without removing the network from my Preferred Network list. The reason is simple: I threw out the scrap of paper where I jotted down my WEP* network key. So - to delete the network from the preferred list, I would have to reset my router, rename it, set a new network key, then enter that into both my computer and my tivo.

Surely there’s an easier way. Can any of you tech-Dopers help me out with this one?

  • Why WEP? Well, my TiVo can’t handle anything else. I want to have some security, and WEP is all it can take.
2

Nevermind. System Restore is my friend.

If a passing mod would put this out of its misery…

3

change the transmission?

4

Now that system restore got it fixed, go and take a look at the settings, this way if you fubar it again, you might remember the settings and can go back and fix them.
Oh, and as long as you don’t mind having your WEP written down on a scrap of paper, why not set it to something easy to remember but hard to guess, for example abcdefabcdef0123456701234567 or 00aa11bb22cc33dd44ee55ff66

5

That’s brilliant. No, I’m serious, I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.

I mean, this is just my home network. Anyone with the dedication and capability to crack the WEP is going to get on my system no matter what I do. The only point of my security measures whatsoever is to make my neighbors work that much harder if they simply must steal my wireless.

6

More important wireless question:

How do I make it so it stops kicking me every few minutes? I’ve had this problem with multiple routers on multiple PCs and laptops with multiple OS’s. Any ideas?